Jane Erickson, manager of an electronics division, was not pleased with the results that had recently been reported concerning the division’s activity-based management implementation project. For one thing, the project had taken eight months longer than projected and had exceeded the budget by nearly 35 percent. But even more vexatious was the fact that after all was said and done, about three-fourths of the plants were reporting that the activity-based product costs were not much different for most of the products than those of the old costing system. Plant managers were indicating that they were continuing to use the old costs as they were easier to compute and understand. Yet, at the same time, they were complaining that they were having a hard time meeting the bids of competitors. Reliable sources were also revealing that the division’s product costs were higher than many competitors’. This outcome perplexed plant managers because their control system still continued to report favorable materials and labor efficiency variances. They complained that ABM had failed to produce any significant improvement in cost performance. Jane decided to tour several of the plants and talk with the plant managers. After the tour, she realized that her managers did not understand the concept of non-value-added costs nor did they have a good grasp of the concept of kaizen costing. No efforts were being made to carefully consider the activity information that had been produced. One typical plant manager threw up his hands and said: “This is too much data. Why should I care about all this detail? I do not see how this can help me improve my plant’s performance. They tell me that inspection is not a necessary activity and does not add value. I simply can’t believe that inspecting isn’t value-added and necessary. If we did not inspect, we would be making and sending more bad products to customers.” Required: Explain why Jane’s division is having problems with its ABM implementation.

The Personnel Department at LastCall Enterprises handles many administrative tasks for the two divisions that make up LastCall: LaidBack and StressedOut. LaidBack division manages the company’s traditional business line. This business, although lucrative, is currently not growing. StressedOut, on the other hand, is the company’s new business, which has experienced double-digit growth for each of the last three years. The cost allocation system at LastCall allocates all corporate costs to the divisions based on a variety of cost allocation bases. Personnel costs are allocated based on the average number of employees in the two divisions. There are two basic activities in the Personnel Department. The first, called employee maintenance, manages employee records. Virtually all of this activity occurs when employees are hired or leave the company. The other activity is payroll, which is an ongoing activity and requires the same amount of work for each employee regardless of the…

The Personnel Department at LastCall Enterprises handles many administrative tasks for the two divisions that make up LastCall: LaidBack and StressedOut. LaidBack division manages the company’s traditional business line. This business, although lucrative, is currently not growing. StressedOut, on the other hand, is the company’s new business, which has experienced double-digit growth for each of the last three years. The cost allocation system at LastCall allocates all corporate costs to the divisions based on a variety of cost allocation bases. Personnel costs are allocated based on the average number of employees in the two divisions. There are two basic activities in the Personnel Department. The first, called employee maintenance, manages employee records. Virtually all of this activity occurs when employees are hired or leave the company. The other activity is payroll, which is an ongoing activity and requires the same amount of work for each employee regardless of the employee’s…

A new factory manager was hired for a company that was experiencing slow production rates and lower production volumes than demanded by management. Upon investigation, the manager found that the workers were poorly motivated and not closely supervised. Midway through the quarter, an incentive program was initiated, and cash bonuses were given when workers hit their production targets. Within a short time, production output increased, but th bonuses had to be charged to the direct labor budget. This could produce an A. unfavorable direct materials cost variance B. unfavorable direct labor cost variance OC. unfavorable direct materials efficiency variance OD. unfavorable direct labor efficiency variance

A cost analyst showed the company president a graph that portrayed the firm’s utility cost as semivariable. The president criticized the graph by saying, “This fixed-cost component doesn’t look right to me. If we shut down the plant for six months, we wouldn’t incur half of these costs.” How should the cost analyst respond?

Kelly Gray, production manager, was upset with the latest performance report, which indicated that she was 100,000 over budget. Given the efforts that she and her workers had made, she was confident that they had met or beat the budget. Now, she was not only upset but also genuinely puzzled over the results. Three itemsdirect labor, power, and setupswere over budget. The actual costs for these three items follow: Kelly knew that her operation had produced more units than originally had been budgeted, so more power and labor had naturally been used. She also knew that the uncertainty in scheduling had led to more setups than planned. When she pointed this out to John Huang, the controller, he assured her that the budgeted costs had been adjusted for the increase in productive activity. Curious, Kelly questioned John about the methods used to make the adjustment. JOHN: If the actual level of activity differs from the original planned level, we adjust the budget by using budget formulasformulas that allow us to predict what the costs will be for different levels of activity. KELLY: The approach sounds reasonable. However, Im sure something is wrong here. Tell me exactly how you adjusted the costs of labor, power, and setups. JOHN: First, we obtain formulas for the individual items in the budget by using the method of least squares. We assume that cost variations can be explained by variations in productive activity where activity is measured by direct labor hours. Here is a list of the cost formulas for the three items you mentioned. The variable X is the number of direct labor hours: Labor cost = 10X Power cost = 5,000 + 4X Setup cost = 100,000 KELLY: I think I see the problem. Power costs dont have a lot to do with direct labor hours. They have more to do with machine hours. As production increases, machine hours increase more rapidly than direct labor hours. Also, ... JOHN: You know, you have a point. The coefficient of determination for power cost is only about 50 percent. That leaves a lot of unexplained cost variation. The coefficient for labor, however, is much betterit explains about 96 percent of the cost variation. Setup costs, of course, are fixed. KELLY: Well, as I was about to say, setup costs also have very little to do with direct labor hours. And I might add that they certainly are not fixedat least not all of them. We had to do more setups than our original plan called for because of the scheduling changes. And we have to pay our people when they work extra hours. It seems as if we are always paying overtime. I wonder if we simply do not have enough people for the setup activity. Supplies are used for each setup, and these are not cheap. Did you build these extra costs of increased setup activity into your budget? JOHN: No, we assumed that setup costs were fixed. I see now that some of them could vary as the number of setups increases. Kelly, let me see if I can develop some cost formulas based on better explanatory variables. Ill get back with you in a few days. Assume that after a few days work, John developed the following cost formulas, all with a coefficient of determination greater than 90 percent: Labor cost = 10X; where X = Direct labor hours Power cost = 68,000 + 0.9Y; where Y = Machine hours Setup cost = 98,000 + 400Z; where Z = Number of setups The actual measures of each of the activity drivers are as follows: Required: 1. Prepare a performance report for direct labor, power, and setups using the direct-labor-based formulas. 2. Prepare a performance report for direct labor, power, and setups using the multiple cost driver formulas that John developed. 3. Of the two approaches, which provides the most accurate picture of Kellys performance? Why? 4. After reviewing the approach to performance measurement, a consultant remarked that non-value-added cost trend reports would be a much better performance measurement approach than comparing actual costs with budgeted costseven if activity flexible budgets were used. Do you agree or disagree? Explain.

Recently, Ulrich Company received a report from an external consulting group on its quality costs. The consultants reported that the companys quality costs total about 21 percent of its sales revenues. Somewhat shocked by the magnitude of the costs, Rob Rustin, president of Ulrich Company, decided to launch a major quality improvement program. For the coming year, management decided to reduce quality costs to 17 percent of sales revenues. Although the amount of reduction was ambitious, most company officials believed that the goal could be realized. To improve the monitoring of the quality improvement program, Rob directed Pamela Golding, the controller, to prepare monthly performance reports comparing budgeted and actual quality costs. Budgeted costs and sales for the first two months of the year are as follows: The following actual sales and actual quality costs were reported for January: Required: 1. Reorganize the monthly budgets so that quality costs are grouped in one of four categories: appraisal, prevention, internal failure, or external failure. (Essentially, prepare a budgeted cost of quality report.) Also, identify each cost as variable (V) or fixed (F). (Assume that no costs are mixed.) 2. Prepare a performance report for January that compares actual costs with budgeted costs. Comment on the companys progress in improving quality and reducing its quality costs.

Bill Fremont, division controller and CMA, was upset by a recent memo he received from the divisional manager, Steve Preston. Bill was scheduled to present the divisions financial performance at headquarters in one week. In the memo, Steve had given Bill some instructions for this upcoming report. In particular, Bill had been told to emphasize the significant improvement in the divisions profits over last year. Bill, however, didnt believe that there was any real underlying improvement in the divisions performance and was reluctant to say otherwise. He knew that the increase in profits was because of Steves conscious decision to produce more inventory. In an earlier meeting, Steve had convinced his plant managers to produce more than they knew they could sell. He argued that by deferring some of this periods fixed costs, reported profits would jump. He pointed out two significant benefits. First, by increasing profits, the division could exceed the minimum level needed so that all the managers would qualify for the annual bonus. Second, by meeting the budgeted profit level, the division would be better able to compete for much-needed capital. Bill objected but had been overruled. The most persuasive counterargument was that the increase in inventory could be liquidated in the coming year as the economy improved. Bill, however, considered this event unlikely. From past experience, he knew that it would take at least two years of improved market demand before the productive capacity of the division was exceeded. Required: 1. Discuss the behavior of Steve Preston, the divisional manager. Was the decision to produce for inventory an ethical one? 2. What should Bill Fremont do? Should he comply with the directive to emphasize the increase in profits? If not, what options does he have? 3. Chapter 1 listed ethical standards for management accountants. Identify any standards that apply in this situation.

Reeve Lumber Company has a small information systems department consisting of five people. A backlog of approximately 15 months exists for requests for new systems applications to even be considered. Both information users and systems personnel are unhappy with this state of affairs. The users feel that the systems department is not responsive enough to their needs, while the systems personnel feel overworked, frustrated, and unappreciated.Janet Hubert, the manager of the systems department, has decided that she needs to take a proactive measure. She is requesting the funds to purchase a CASE system for approximately $75,000 that takes about 2 months to install and train workers how to use it. The president of the company, Mike Cassidy, initially responded by questioning the wisdom of taking the systems personnel away from their duties when they are backlogged so they can learn a system. Prepare a memo from Hubert to Cassidy. In the memo, outline the expected benefits of purchasing and…

Waterfun Technology produces engines for recreational boats. Because of competitive pressures, the company was making an effort to reduce costs. As part of this effort, management implemented an activity-based management system and began focusing its attention on processes and activities. Receiving was among the processes (activities) that were carefully studied. The study revealed that the number of receiving orders was a good driver for receiving costs. During the last year, the company incurred fixed receiving costs of $630,000 (salaries of 10 employees). These fixed costs provide a capacity of processing 72,000 receiving orders (7,200 per employee at practical capacity). Management decided that the efficient level for receiving should use 36,000 receiving orders. Required: 1. Explain why receiving would be viewed as a value-added activity. Which of these are possible reasons that explain why the demand for receiving is more than the efficient level of 36,000 orders. 2. Break…

Sanchez Trucking has been experiencing delays at its warehouse operations. Management hired a consultant to find out why service deliveries to local businesses have taken longer than they should. The consultant narrowed down the problem to the number of work crews loading and unloading trucks. Each crew consists of 7 employees who work as a team on a variety of tasks; each employee works a full 40 hours a week. However, costs are also a concern. The consultant advised management that they could supplement work crews with short-term employees, at a higher cost, to cover unexpected needs on a weekly basis. Each work crew permanently hired by Sanchez costs $3,500 per week in wages and benefits, while a crew of short-term employees costs $6,000 per week. Complicating the decision is the fact that the weekly hourly requirements for work crews is uncertain because of the volatility in the number of deliveries to be made. Deliberating with management, the consultant arrived at the following…

Waterfun Technology produces engines for recreational boats. Because of competitive pressures, the company was making an effort to reduce costs. As part of this effort, management implemented an activity-based management system and began focusing its attention on processes and activities. Receiving was among the processes (activities) that were carefully studied. The study revealed that the number of receiving orders was a good driver for receiving costs. During the last year, the company incurred fixed receiving costs of $630,000 (salaries of 10 employees). These fixed costs provide a capacity of processing 72,000 receiving orders (7,200 per employee at practical capacity). Management decided that the efficient level for receiving should use 36,000 receiving orders. Required: 1. Explain why receiving would be viewed as a value-added activity. List all possible reasons. Also, list some possible reasons that explain why the demand for receiving is more than the efficient level of…

Solution Summary: The author explains the problems occurring in the division of Ms. J with respect to their activity based management implementations, stating that significant effort has to be undertaken to train the managers and to better understand the use activity data.

Videos

Chapter 12 Solutions